I am a little late on this one but I had to work all weekend so I really didn’t have the time. I am sure a lot of you watched the VP debate last week and I just wanted to give my 2 cents.
On the overall performance I would say they were about even. Palin showed confidence and knowledge of the issues while Biden didn’t say anything stupid. They both stuck to their specialties which is foreign affairs for Biden and energy and standing up to corruption for Palin.
Palin did catch a couple of Joe Biden’s lies, but I wish she would have called him out on more of them. I guess she would have spent the whole time correcting him though. For those who were not counting, there was somewhere between 10 and 14 lies from Biden during the debate.
Here are some of the items that I think that Palin should have expounded on more.
Biden and Obama love to tell everyone that they plan to bring our troops back home within 16 months of taking office. She should have brought out that they came up with this plan without once conferring with the generals on the ground. They also based their position on the surge without talking with military commanders. On the other side, McCain made numerous trips to Iraq to evaluate the situation and based his decision on information he gathered. This is how a leader should have handled the situation. Obama went as far as saying that even the people who came up with the surge plan (Gen Petraeus) didn’t even believe it would work. I thought this was quite an insult to our military and obviously an untrue statement. It also would have been a good idea to stress that McCain went against the Bush administration’s Rumsfeld and was pushing for a similar surge back in 2004. If the plan had been implemented back then, it is a possibility that they could have stopped the insurgency from gaining momentum in the first place.
More specifically for Biden, Sarah Palin should have brought up Biden’s statement before he was picked for VP that leaving Iraq in disarray would lead to a broader mid east conflict. Despite this belief by Biden, he still advocated to bring our troops home immediately because it was politically popular.
Another point that Biden tried to make is that a McCain / Palin ticket would give tax cuts to corporations. This is a true statement, but Palin should have explained to the American people why they want to cut this tax rate. They are trying to make America competitive in the world market. America has one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world. By lowering this rate, we will encourage companies to do business in the United States, which of course means more jobs. It has nothing to do with pampering to big corporations and everything to do with creating jobs for our people. I think conservatives sometimes take for granted that people understand these concepts when they actually do not.
Palin should also have attacked the fact that Biden said that he and Obama had fought for reform of Freddie and Fannie. This was one of the major lies of the debate as they were both part of the Democratic force that blocked legislation to do so. They were not as big as Frank or Dodd in killing this type of legislation, but as many columnists have noted, Obama was noticeably silent on this issue.
Biden also attacked McCain’s bi-partisan efforts especially when it came to issues such as global warming and energy. Palin should have given the example of the McCain - Lieberman global warming bill in 2003. This was bi-partisan legislation that was not backed by the President, but did show that McCain saw an issue and went against the grain to try to solve the problem. Palin did do a good job in pointing out that Obama voted for the Bush energy policy that he criticized, but she missed an opportunity to counter Biden’s point that he voted for it because it gave resources to alternative energy. If this is the case, then why has he not pushed Pelosi to bring the Republicans all encompassing energy plan to a vote. It contains far more resources for alternative energy than any plan thus far and it will make us energy independent. Democrats consistently misunderstand the purpose for drilling here at home. It is not for immediate reduction of costs for fuel; it is to ensure we do not have to rely on other countries for our fuel sources and that we keep more of our money here at home.
Well, those are my two cents. I am sure there are more points to make, but these are some of the major ones I saw right away.
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Palin’s “awe shucks” approach works. The American people like her personality, she is likeable & very sharp. I like her past history of coming down on corruption in government. There is a streak of Liberty/Libertarian in her ideals. I could support her in a run for the precidency in 2012.